


Glory and Gore

by WhyWhyNot



Series: A Host and a Legion [1]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Attempted, Blanket Permission, Character Death, Child Abuse, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Insanity, Non-binary character, Police Brutality, Prophets, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2020-03-17 10:23:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18963340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhyWhyNot/pseuds/WhyWhyNot
Summary: Matty Murdock sees an angel when he is nine. Or maybe it was a devil.





	1. Chapter 1

Matty isn't sure if it's supposed to be a blessing or a curse. 

Matty isn't sure if it even _matters_.

\---

When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck.

\---

Matty is nine, and he lies on a hospital bed, and everything is _dark_ and _loud_ and _abrasive_ and _stinky_ and the air tastes like _death_.

Dad is there and Matty feels his face, and his voice is like thunder and his breath is like a desert wind.

Dad is there, and Matty _can't see_.

\---

Matty is nine-almost-ten and he hears sirens from under his blanket. They scream, and scream, and _scream_ , and S _c_ **r** E **a** M, until his mind goes _blank_.

Matty comes back to himself to _~~pain in his hand~~ ~~the smell of blood~~_ Dad holding him down.

He broke the lightbulb of his _~~useless why was it still there~~_ desk lamp, sliced his palm on the shards of glass.

Dad stitches the cut, and take everything that cut or break out of the room, and says he's getting the cleaning products.

The room smells like blood, and when he runs his hands on it he can feel his own handwriting, letters twisted twisted and strange _~~like written in the dark with bloody fingertips~~_.

( _ ~~innocent blood shed at the circling lights eye for eye a metal storm in the shape of a man and the dead who walk by his side innocent blood shed in a three sided war~~_.)

Dad is crying in the kitchen. 

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck._

The truck doesn't hit any of them.

\---

Matty is ten, and Dad is _dead_ , and the nuns take him to his room and present him someone they call 'Dewayne'.

The nuns leave, and when Matty tries to talk the name he says is 'Joan'.

They agree to only use her real name when they're alone. 

\---

Matty is ten, and the world screams in his head, all high-pitched tastes and bitter smells and pungent touches and cutting sounds, and Matty can't, it's _too much_ , it's _too much_ , he _can't_ , and an old man comes in to teach him, to 'help' him.

(Stick hurts Matty. With his fists and his words and his staff, with lye in his food and poisonous gases, throws him from rooftops and handcuffed into the Hudson, and Matty learns, but also _hurts_ , and the only one who says it's wrong is Joan.)

Stick wants to teach Matty, but not to _help_ him. He doesn't want Matty, he doesn't give a single _fuck_ about Matty, he wants a soldier, not a child. 

He wants a _weapon_ , not a _person_.

Stick leaves.

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them._

From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their _radioactive_ warning.

\---

When Matty is eleven, she tells Joan she's not always a boy, and not always a girl, and not always either. 

"That's why you go by 'Matty', right? Because it's gender-neutral."

Yes. That's why.

They agree not to tell the nuns.

\---

When Matty is eleven, Joan find xir writing on their bedroom floor with her ballpoint pen.

~~_snake-people leviathans Death's lover the ram-headed man six will fight for the children of Eve heart of a star in the unsleeping city_ ~~

They agree not to tell the nuns about _that_ either. 

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their _radioactive_ warning._

It's lucky none of them fell.

\---

When Matty is twelve, Sister Julia find her having a ' _crisis_ in the chapel, and comes to the conclusion that she's _possessed_. By the _Devil_.

( _Murdock boys got the Devil in them_ , and she's not a boy right now but sometimes she is, and maybe that's enough to make the saying true.)

Sister Julia decides to exorcise her, and Father Christian agrees to help.

So they decides to do it in the sacristy, and Matty...

Matty _doesn't remember_ what happens. But when they're done, there are cracks in some of the pews, half the stained-glass windows are shattered, and all the candles consumed themselves. 

(Matty and Joan hides the 'crisis' better after that.)

\---

When Matty is twelve, Father Christian stops xir after mass, and tells xir to stay. 

When everyone else has left the building, he pust his hand on xir shoulder, and Matty shudders at how _wrong_ it feels. 

"Do you remember the exorcism, Matthew?"

His hand slides down xir side, comes to rest on xir hip. The feeling of _wrongness_ intensifies, like a nest of wriggling worms in the pit of his stomach, like an _oily_ feeling on xir skin.

"We managed to cast the Devil out, but it left..."

The hand moves again, and is joined by the other, and Matty can feel the fingers through the fabric of xir pants, working to open them, and xe is _petrified_ and doesn't even know _why_.

"Traces. It left traces inside of you, and we have to do _special things_ to make them leave."

He's lying, Matty knows he is, and Stick taught xir, xe _knows_ how to fight, but Father Christian is a _priest_ , Matty _knows_ him, why does xe feel like xe should fight, why is xe so afraid xe _can't move_?

Father Christian pulls xir pants down.

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their _radioactive_ warning. It's lucky none of them fell._

But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground.

\---

When Matty is fourteen, Father Christian stops asking her to stay after mass.

Matty is relieved, and if Joan notices, she doesn't do anything but smuggle a pot of Ben&Jerry's, and they share melted ice cream in the middle of the night.

(Maybe Matty will finally feel clean again.)

\---

When Matty is fourteen, Father Christian asks little Jimmy Zimny to stay after mass.

(" _God will understand, Jimmy, or he wouldn't have made you so tempting_...")

Matty sneaks into the chapel, and Jimmy's heart is beating very fast.

(He's afraid.)

She hears the pants hit the ground and she remembers the _hands_ on her skin, the shame, the feeling of being _dirty_ , and

When Matty comes back to consciousness, she's alone in the sacristy and everything smells like _blood_.

What is left of Father Christian lays at her feet.

(Joan finds her, takes her to the showers before anyone notices, scrubs the blood out of her hair.)

(Matty tries to ignore the rumors.)

The nuns never find out how the walls of the chapel got painted with Father Christian's insides. 

Jimmy avoids Matty until she leaves Saint Agnes.

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their _radioactive_ warning. It's lucky none of them fell. But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground._

And Matty sees his eyes.

\---

When Matty is sixteen, she sits on her bed while Joan puts on girl clothes, and they sneak out of the orphanage in the middle of the night to buy makeup. 

They have ten dollars in crumpled bills and lost coins, tension and excitement shaking in their belly, high on anticipation. 

Ten dollars, it turns out, is not a lot, and makeup is more expensive than expected. 

(They only buy a pink lipstick tube, but they still laugh all the way back, and in Joan's bed for the rest of the night.)

In the morning, they try the lipstick on, the feeling of it strange on xir lips, but not uncomfortable. 

"Joan, am I pretty?  
\- The _prettiest_."

They can only keep it on for five minutes if they don't want the nuns to find out, but it's still worth it. 

\---

When Matty is sixteen, an older boy comes in their room without knocking, just as Joan tries on a shirt sneaked from the girl laundry. 

(He makes fun, like an _asshole_ , and tells the nuns, and they scold Joan and takes away the skirt and the lipstick, but not the clothes hidden under Matty's mattress. 

Joan cries. 

A few months later they have a fight and Joan sneaks out on her own, and by the time Matty hears Joan call him the fight is already over.

She ran into the boy, who aged out of the orphanage, in a back alley, and he decided to have fun with ' _the little tranny_ '.

Joan didn't mean to kill him, she really didn't, but in the struggle he hit his head against a fire escape, and...

Matty helps her hide the body. 

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their _radioactive_ warning. It's lucky none of them fell. But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground, and Matty sees his eyes._

It's not an old man.

\---

Matty is twenty-two, and Joan and her are entering law school at Columbia. 

Joan stands in their dorm room, and Matty can hear the smile in her voice. 

"Three more years, Matty! Three more years, and we're _lawyers_!"

They celebrate with a shared pot of melted Ben&Jerry's.

\---

Matty is twenty-two, and Joan says there are leviathans in the sky of New York.

And then there are aliens in the streets, who look like strangely reptilian men, and Matty remembers words written in ballpoint pen on a bedroom floor. 

It seems that he was right in his prophecy.

They stand on a rooftop to wait, and wonder if the world is ending. 

(Iron Man flies a nuke into a wormhole, and he knows it did.)

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their radioactive warning. It's lucky none of them fell. But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground, and Matty sees his eyes. It's not an old man._

It's eyes-covered wheels and wings in strange places, deformed limbs and mouths full of teeth, pillars of salt and holy fire.

\---

Matty is twenty-three and meeting Elektra, and Elektra is nice in that she _isn't_ , in that she has something in her that reminds xir of Joan and xirself. Sharp edges like broken knives, burning anger and hungry darkness.

(They're lightning storms trapped in crystal balls, and the glass is starting to crack.)

They date, and it's like a whirlwind, and Matty is _happy_.

(They go at Fogwell's to spar, and they fight together like they were _made_ for it.)

(Joan warns xir, tells xir Elektra tends to take things too far, but xe doesn't listen.)

\---

Matty is twenty-three and there's blood on her hands and a choice to make.

Roscoe Sweeney lies at her feet, and it would be easy to slit his throat, to break his neck, to keep hitting until he dies. 

(There's a darkness inside of her, hungry for blood and broken bones, there's an anger burning like fire, broken knives that cut those who come close.)

 _Thou shalt not kill_ , says the Bible, and Matty didn't _mean_ to kill Father Christian, doesn't even remembers doing so, and killing Sweeney in cold blood isn't a line she is willing to cross. 

(She's a lightning storm trapped in a crystal ball, as much smooth glass as jagged edges, as much fragile mirrors as thunder and wind.)

She goes back alone to her dorm. Elektra doesn't come back to Columbia. 

She shares a bed with Joan that night.

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their radioactive warning. It's lucky none of them fell. But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground, and Matty sees his eyes. It's not an old man. It's eyes-covered wheels and wings in strange places, deformed limbs and mouths full of teeth, pillars of salt and holy fire._

It's a smell of blood and feathers, of dust and metal, of the void between the stars. 

\---

When Matty is twenty-six, he and Joan are lawyers, interning at a prestigious law firm, and Joan starts hormones. 

"Fuck it," she says, and she starts filling the forms for an official name and gender change. 

It feels good to call her Joan in public. 

Things are good.

\---

When Matty is twenty-six, something in Landman & Zach makes him feel _wrong_ , like the people in the hallways are dead and full of worms, and things are even worse at the precinct.

There are cries, at night, and Matty can hear them from the apartment he shares with Joan. 

(He tries to ignore it.)

It's a little girl. 

(It's none of his business.)

She prays, too, in a little choked voice. 

(He's a storm in crystal ball and there are already cracks in the glass, he _can't_ afford to care or he's going to fall apart.)

Her father comes into her room at night, touches her her in places he shouldn't touch, do things to her he shouldn't do.

(Like Father Christian did.)

Calling the cops twice doesn't work.

(He's a storm in crystal ball and there are already cracks in the glass, maybe if he uses them to let the wind out he won't shatter and fall apart.)

"You're not going without a proper mask, and you're not going alone."

Matty breaks a man's jaw, and sleep more soundly this night.

He's glad that Joan came with him.

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their radioactive warning. It's lucky none of them fell. But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground, and Matty sees his eyes. It's not an old man. It's eyes-covered wheels and wings in strange places, deformed limbs and mouths full of teeth, pillars of salt and holy fire. It's a smell of blood and feathers, of dust and metal, of the void between the stars._

It's a taste of salt and blood, of bread and wine, of sunlight on a midsummer day.

\---

When Matty is twenty-seven, xe leaves Landman & Zack with Joan, and they start Murdock & Williams. 

Joan receives her new ID the same day, and she read the name 'Joan Ranielle Williams' aloud for Matty.

And they free Karen Page and gain a secretary, and slowly get more and more clients for their practice, and the three of them (and Ben Urich, and Brett, and a little bit Hoffman) win against Fisk, and the precinct is cleansed from corrupt cops, and Hell's Kitchen is that much of a better place. 

\---

When Matty is twenty-seven, the newspaper calls him 'the Devil of Hell's Kitchen'.

There's a boy, and people who want to sell him like they would toys or animals, and saving him is grim, dirty work.

There's Claire, sewing him up in her apartment, teaching him how to best torture a man and getting tortured in return, but still coming when he calls her, still not giving him up, because she believes a man beating up thugs in back alley is something the city needs.

There's dust in his hair, and Vladimir's blood on his hands, and he can still hear Fisk's voice in his ear, _you and I have a lot in common_ , and smell the fire in the hair. 

Bombs went off in Hell's Kitchen, the air is full of screams, and Matty doesn't remember what happened in the sewers. 

There's Mrs Cardenas, murdered in her own home for fighting to keep it, for drugs and money and a rotten ideal.

There's Nobu, asking for respect while working with the Ranskahovs who sell people like meat and slaves, with Gao who plays with minds until people maim themselves, with Fisk who pretends to save Hell's Kitchen by burning it down and selling it to the highest bidder, Nobu who asks for respect while working with killers and a killer himself, Nobu who drags him through the floor by the hook in his side, Nobu who burns by his hand.

 _Brimstone_ , thinks Matty, and then _holy fire_.

(He doesn't know which one it is.)

There's Fisk, of course, chess and puppetmaster, using people like pawns and dolls, and if he is in love is it enough for redemption? If Vanessa loves him back? Fisk, who had Mrs Cardenas killed, who came when Nobu died and pinned Matty to the floor, his hands _huge_ against his skin when he went to lift his mask.

(Fisk, who lost his mind and never found it back, afraid of birds and eyes and speaking of angels and storms trapped in broken glass.)

There's Karen, who came in the office one night smelling like fear and tearsalt and gunpowder. 

There's Joan, who washed blood-stained clothes in the sink with cold waters, who took a mask and mace and a baseball bat and went to beat up muggers in back alleys because _you can't do this alone Matty_ , who took a gun and threatened Hoffman until he made confession to Brett, Joan who broke two ribs and a finger saving a girl from Anatoly, and smiled at the news of his death.

\---

_When Matty is nine, he pushes an old man out of the way of a truck. The truck doesn't hit any of them. From the corner of his eye, Matty notices the barrels in the back of the truck, and their radioactive warning. It's lucky none of them fell. But the old man, the old man hit his head against the hard ground, and Matty sees his eyes. It's not an old man. It's eyes-covered wheels and wings in strange places, deformed limbs and mouths full of teeth, pillars of salt and holy fire. It's a smell of blood and feathers, of dust and metal, of the void between the stars. It's a taste of salt and blood, of bread and wine, of sunlight on a midsummer day._

And his eyes burn, and he never sees anymore. 

\---

Matty isn't sure if it's supposed to be a blessing or a curse. Matty isn't sure if it even matters.

Matty isn't even sure she _cares_.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Because Joan deserves a POV too

Joan is scared, sometimes. Very, very scared, a low, rolling thing in her stomach. 

\---

The tattoo parlor is brightly lit.

\---

When she’s nine, she breaks her arm.

(She doesn’t call herself Joan yet, even though the name Dewayne itches like maladjusted clothes.)

Her arms hurts, hurts _so much_ , and Mom takes her to the hospital.

(In the emergency room, there’s a boy with his dad, and the boy’s eyes are _weird_ , red and clouded, and tears are running down his cheeks. She waves with the arm that doesn’t hurt, but he doesn’t react.)

\---

When she’s nine, her parents die.

(Someone broke into their home. Someone broke into their home, so Mom called the police, and when the police came, they shot Dad, and Mom when she screamed.)

She didn’t scream. She hid in the closet, and then, she doesn’t remember anything.

(That’s a lie. She remembers the blood slowly turning the carpet red.) 

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit._

Joan is relieved.

\---

When she’s ten, she starts calling herself Joan in her head.

( _Joan_ , like Joan Jones and Joan Little and Joan of Ark, a name for warriors and fighters, and she will never kneel in the dark hoping nobody finds her. Never again.)

The name feels right in a way Dewayne never did.

\---

When Joan is ten, she’s sent to Saint Agnes.

A few days after her arrival, Sister Maggie comes in her room with a little boy, and tells her she will have to share.

(It’s the boy from the ER.)

He calls her Joan.

(He asks her to call him _Matty_ , not _Matt_ or _Matthew_ , and she does.)

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved._

She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it.

\---

When Joan is eleven, she realizes that maybe Matty isn’t a _boy_ all the time.

(She’s a bit ashamed it took her so long.)

So Matty is a girl, and Matty is a boy, and Matty is both and Matty is neither, and it’s _fine_.

(Really, it’s not the strangest thing about Matty, nor the more worrisome.)

\---

When Joan is eleven, Matty has a ‘crisis’.

(They were complaining about math homeworks when Matty went silent and still, eyes rolling back in xir head until the white is all she can see, words coming out mangled and backward and in foreign languages.)

Xe grabs her pen, and kneels on the floor, and starts writing strange words, and Joan doesn’t know what to do.

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it._

(Really, her choice was made a long time ago.)

\---

When Joan is twelve, Sister Julia and Father Christian practice an exorcism on Matty.

She doesn’t know what happens, not exactly, but she’s playing outside when half the chapel windows shatters.

(The shards of glass on the ground look like blood and diamonds.)

She has to wait until the night for Matty to tell her _they were trying to get the Devil out_.

(Matty always seems uneasy in Father Christian’s presence afterwards.)

\---

When Joan is twelve, she thinks about her parents. 

(She thinks about the gunshots, about hugging her legs in a dark closet hoping she doesn’t get found, about the blood stains on the carpet getting bigger and bigger and _bigger_ …)

(She thinks about the man who killed her parents walking away free.)

Checks and balances. The Justice system is supposed to be made of checks and balances. 

She’s going to be a lawyer.

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago._

She shows the drawing to the tattooist.

\---

When Joan is fourteen, she kisses Albert Allmon in a bathroom stall.

(It tastes sweet from the jam on their toasts this morning, and it’s a bit weird, but nice too.)

Joan really likes Al, and he and Matty gets along pretty well. But Al doesn’t like girls and that, that feels _wrong_.

(Joan is _not_ a boy.)

They don’t kiss again.

\---

When Joan is fourteen, Matty kills Father Christian.

(He _deserves_ it. He deserves it _he deserves it hedeservesithedeservesit_ …)

Joan finds Matty standing in the chapel, covered in blood.

(There’s blood on the floor, too, and on the walls, chapelets of bowels hanging from the ceiling, ten little finger bones on the piano touches, a tongue and teeth sunk in the communion wine.)

She drags Matty to the showers, strips xir naked, wash the blood from xir hair until finally, _finally_ , xe starts to cry.

(She steals a few candles and carefully burns the bloodstained clothes.)

The other children start avoiding them.

(She pretends she can’t hear their whispers.)

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago. She shows the drawing to the tattooist._

He nods.

\---

When Joan is sixteen, she sneaks girl clothing from the laundry room and try them.

They feel good.

(She ignores the way her shoulders seem to broad, her voice too low, her Adam apple too prominent.)

She tries a pink lipstick she bought with Matty and smiles to herself in the mirror.

\---

When Joan is sixteen, she kills a man.

She doesn’t _mean_ to. It’s an _accident_.

Despite the fight they just had, Matty comes when she calls him, and they get rid of the body.

(She wonders what it tells about her that it doesn’t keep her awake at night.)

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago. She shows the drawing to the tattooist. He nods._

It takes some time for the tattoo to heal.

\---

When Joan is twenty-two, she goes to Columbia.

As far as housing goes, the cheapest option is to live in the dorms.

(She’s pretended to be a man for twenty-two years. She can hold three years longer.)

She asks to be roomed with Matty. Her request is granted.

\---

When Joan is twenty-two, the world ends.

(There are snake-like aliens pouring from the sky, and a horned man leading them, and their ships are shaped like leviathan. There are six Avengers.)

She thinks about Matty when she was eleven, writing prophecies on the floor, and wonders what the _heart of a star_ is.

(She’s standing on a rooftop with Matty when the nuke starts to fall, and if the world is to end, at least, she will have a great view for the Apocalypse.)

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago. She shows the drawing to the tattooist. He nods. It takes some time for the tattoo to heal._

It takes even more time for the ink to fate to its definitive shade.

\---

When Joan is twenty-three, she meets Elektra.

(So does Matty.)

Joan _likes_ Elektra,she really does. She’s sharp smiles and sharper wit, jagged edges, white teeth, and there’s a darkness inside of her that echoes her own.

(She _likes_ Elektra, not in the way she loves her parents or Matty.)

Joan doesn’t _love_ Elektra, but Matty does, and Joan is happy for xir.

At first.

(Matty comes home with cuts and bruises, and xe laughs when she asks and says _it’s just sparring_ and maybe it’s true, maybe everything’s fine, but she remembers Matty’s quiet _it’s just training_ whenever Stick sent him back with broken fingers.)

(Matty calls Elektra _a lightning storm in a crystal ball_ and he’s not _wrong_ , but Elektra wants to smash the glass, and one day or another, she’s going to go _too far_.)

And then, she _does_ go to far, and Matty is left heartbroken.

(It’s okay. They’re going to be fine. They always are, in the end.)

\---

When Joan is twenty-three, she dates Blake Altum.

Blake is sweet and vicious, honey and teeth, and Joan really, really likes her.

(She likes talking with her, and the fun they have in the bedroom, but she doesn’t _love_ her, not the way one is supposed to love their girlfriend.)

They break up, but they stay friends, sometimes with added benefits.

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago. She shows the drawing to the tattooist. He nods. It takes some time for the tattoo to heal, and even more time for the ink to fate to its definitive shade._

It looks like scars, in the shape of flames.

\---

When Joan is twenty-six, she starts transitioning.

(She looks forward for being called ‘Miss’ instead of ‘Mister’.)

She asks for a name change, and hesitates a moment.

(Does she need a middle name?)

In the end, she writes down _Ranielle_ , like her mom.

\---

When Joan is twenty-six, she becomes the Devil.

(Matty hears a child crying as her father rapes her, and the one supposed to protect her don’t, and when he dresses in black and put on a mask to _break_ him, so does she.)

(She and Matty have been in together for a very long time, and it’s not going to change.)

(She can’t help but remember Father Christian, wonder how many children he _touched_ , how many she could have helped if she had just _noticed_.)

There’s a Devil in Hell’s Kitchen, and Joan is one of its faces.

\---

_The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago. She shows the drawing to the tattooist. He nods. It takes some time for the tattoo to heal, and even more time for the ink to fate to its definitive shade. _It looks like scars, in the shape of flames.__

_“Are your tattoos moving?” asks Blake._

_\---_

_When Joan is twenty-seven, leaves Landmann & Zack and starts Murdock and Williams with Matty._

_(It takes them a while to decide which name will go first, and they end up going with alphabetical order.)_

_She finally gets an ID with the right name, and it feels _right_._

_And Matty and her tear down Fisk’s corrupt empire, with help from Karen and Brett and Ben Ulrich and Elena Cardenas, and with Hoffman’s _cooperation_ , and it may not be enough but it’s a pretty good _start_._

_\---_

_When Joan is twenty-seven, the newspaper call her ‘the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen’._

_There is a girl, barely sixteen, kicked out of home after her parents refused to call her _Rhonda_ instead of _Otis_ , and when Anatoly Ranskahov tries to take her, she breaks two fingers and a few ribs rescuing her._

_There’s Claire, sighing with blood under her fingernails, straightening broken bones and stitching open wounds, weary and brave, _defiant_ under torture._

_There’s dust in her hair, and blood on her hands, and the sound of explosion still rings in her ears, and the smell of smoke and burning flesh fills her lungs with each breath._

_Bombs went off in Hell’s Kitchen, the air is full of screams, and Joan is holding a child’s bowels inside his body._

_There’s Ms Cardenas, sweet and sharp and _dead dead dead_ , killed in her own fucking home._

_There’s a man, a cop, who trades his silence for money with the Ranskahovs, and girls with no papers and no money are going missing, and Joan ties him up in his own car to ask about them, and when he refuses to answer she lights one of his cigarettes._

__Brimstone_ , she thinks, and then, _holy fire_._

_(She presses the burning tip against his skin.)_

_There’s Fisk, the King sitting on his throne, the Spider spinning his web, the Mouldy Fruit spreading its rot, and maybe he loves Vanessa, and maybe Vanessa loves him, but it doesn’t make him any less of a monster, it doesn’t make her want to see his fall any less._

_(Fisk, who _saw_ Matty and lost his mind, and Joan thinks about Matty’s exposed ribs, about xir wet heart beating in the palm of her hand, and swallows back a laugh.)_

_There’s Karen, who hides a gun in her purse and pretends she’s fine._

_There’s Matty, who sat on the bathroom floor to stich xirself back together, Matty who took a mask and a stick and old training and went to beat up rapists because _someone has to do something Joan_ , Matty who burnt Nobu and drove Fisk to madness, Matty who almost died and who shook for days after the night the bombs went off. _

_\---_

__The tattoo parlor is brightly lit, and Joan is relieved. She’s been thinking about it for a long time, keeping a stash of money ready in case she decided to go with it. Really, her choice was made a long time ago. She shows the drawing to the tattooist. He nods. It takes some time for the tattoo to heal, and even more time for the ink to fate to its definitive shade. _It looks like scars, in the shape of flames. “Are your tattoos moving?” asks Blake.__ _

__Joan smiles._ _

__\---_ _

__Joan is scared, sometimes. Very, very scared, a low, rolling thing in her stomach._ _

__It only makes her stronger._ _


	3. Chapter 3

The Church

**Author's Note:**

> I am open to suggestions if anyone wants more in this verse


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